Some urban fantasy and exploring lost youth on the blog today... I hope you all enjoy an excerpt from The Diary of the Empties by writing teacher Craig Soffer. After spending some time in Vietnam, Craig recently moved back to New York and will get his MFA from Sarah Lawrence College. You can find him on Twitter at @craigsoffer.
It's an Empty time and I'm Drifting. The restaurant bar is packed but quiet, the conversations around me muted. The Phil Collins song In the Air ends and is replaced by Mummy Calls’ even Emptier Beauty Has Her Way. Talk shifts from the harsh realities of work and school, bosses and assignments, to dreamier things. Philosophy. Metaphysics. Star Wars. My gin and tonic tastes better than it should. Alcohol, like drugs, can open the way for the Empty. There's no smoking in the bar, and no one is lighting up, yet somehow there's still smoke hanging in the air. A line of conversation catches my ear.
"It's a great place, I mean, you'd love it."
I tune in on a guy in a shirt and tie, girl in a black dress.
"It's got like ten acres of woods, and you can see billions of stars in the sky at night."
"Really?" she says though her body language says she doesn’t care.
"Yeah,” he says. "My parents go up there, like every weekend. They're up there today, but they're coming back tonight. It's like their thing; they go up on Friday evenings, after work. It's like a two hour drive, straight up the Taconic."
"The Taconic, what's that?" she says, flipping her hair.
She's a different kind of empty.
"Look," he says, taking out a smartphone. "I'll show you on Google maps."
Office-Geek starts working an app on his phone. I move up behind them. I have to be subtle about it, but I'm also the kind of guy nobody ever notices.
"So," he says after we've all spent longer looking at the map than necessary, "what do you say? We can drive up any day this week if you can get off work. My parents won't be back up there until late Friday night the earliest."
She looks at him for a moment, then looks away and says, "I have to think about it, you know, because it's not so easy for me to take time off from work, especially this time of year and all," and he translates that into a very strong maybe, but I recognize it for the no-fucking-way that it is. I will be the only one heading to his parents’ place. My shoulder bumps Office-Geek as I slip to another spot at the bar.
"Sorry."
"Whatever."
My car, this weekend's car, is parked outside. It's an Empty, of course, a vehicle that spends its life in a long-term parking lot, heading out on the rare Saturday for a spin on Riverside Drive. Today is Sunday; the car won't be missed until long after it's taken me to this guy’s Empty weekend house where, hopefully, there will be a full fridge.
The music turns again, Jazz instrumental, Coltrane. Time to get moving before I end up part of something I'd just as soon avoid. As soon as I think it, out of the corner of my eye, I see just that something, not there one moment and then there the next, sitting at the very end of the bar, hands wrapped around a double shot of Jameson. A Dirtbag. A hunter out of the Deep Empty. He has a unibrow, sideburns practically muttonchops, hair that looks like a cockroach graveyard.
His eyes find what what he's looking for at the same time mine do. A conversation rapidly becoming an argument at a table for six, and one of those six slipping towards the Empty as the argument gets more intense. I follow the Dirtbag's eyes to a blond, maybe seventeen, maybe not quite, pale, light colored eyes, waif-thin, with an unusually large chest hiding under a heavy brown wool-knit sweater with a turtleneck the size of a life preserver, oversized sleeves that have swallowed her arms. She stares down into her soup bowl while her parents and siblings go at it around her.
I tune in as best I can, despite the distance, and I hear a lot of angry whispers and the father shouts, "Well, she's obviously never given a though to what it's meant to our family’s reputation!"
The girl looks away, staring off into the Empty. The Dirtbag moves, rises like wind through a pile of trash. I wonder why he wants her. I suppose it doesn’t matter.
The argument escalates. The older brother calls for the check. The older sister runs out. The father puts on his coat. When the server arrives, the mother materializes a credit card. The father leaves first. And then they are all gone, except her. They leave her, sitting alone at the table.
I stand and toss an old twenty-dollar bill I lifted from Office-Geek’s pocket moments before onto the bar. The girl is on the way to the restrooms. She stumbles through the smoky darkness. The Dirtbag follows her.
The nice car I stole is waiting outside. I have that Google map memorized. But still I’m moving.
Her ponytail disappears through a door and the Dirtbag catches the door before it closes, and then I'm there, behind him. "Hey, this one's the men's room," I say and jerk a thumb towards the adjacent door.
He turns, startled, glares. I take a deep breath. I can smell the Empty on him. I smile. I know what you are and you know what I am. Let’s not do this here.
He growls and turns away. I step back to let him go and try not to breathe in his stink. He moves out into the crowd, disappears into it, becomes part of the dark and the smoke and the sad music the way only something out of the Empty can. I push open the door.
She's in the stall. I turn to the sink and wash my hands, whistling a tune. "Man," I say aloud, pretending to be looking in the mirror, "but I need a haircut." It’s true. My hair pushes unruly into anarchy.
No response. The girl in the stall does not stir.
“Hey,” I say.
No response. Damn it. I can't leave her in here. Not with him out there. I try to open the stall door, but its bolted.
"Hey, open the door," I say, but she ignores me, or doesn't hear me. I have no choice. I work the hinges out with my pocketknife, his pocketknife--he’s the reason I’m doing this--work the door off, and set it aside. She never stirs. She's on the toilet, but her pants are on, the seat cover is down, and she's simply sitting there, staring at nothing.
I fold the knife away. "Hey," I say. "You need to come with me. You can't stay here."
She doesn't answer me. She's almost catatonic.
I reach out and take her arm by the wrist. It doesn't take any strength for me to pull her up, and we make eye contact for the first time. She smells like roses and vanilla and something citrusy. I lead her out of the bathroom and she follows uncomplaining, her eyes starting into Emptiness. Once we’re in the middle of the restaurant, I think she gets hold of herself for a moment and she says, “They left me here. They hate me because of what I write in my diary. It disappears after I write it.”
I'm still holding her wrist. I look around and spot the Dirtbag. He's watching us. He licks his lips with his fat tongue.
"Come on," I say, moving her through the crowded room. Ben Williams Things Don't Exist plays from hidden speakers.
I drag her through the restaurant, out through the even more crowded bar, and we finally make the front door and stumble out into the street. A flash of white in the sky and thunder booms. It's been drizzling and the rain has left on the pavement puddles that bend the light in strange ways. I get her moving. The Dirtbag follows, shambling, simian-like, knuckles practically scraping sidewalk.
"Come on," I say. We move a little faster and reach the stolen car I'm using. I hit the beeper hanging from the keys to the car, a 2009 gray Saab with dark leather interior, and the car responds with an answering beep and the sound of its doors unlocking. I reach out, open the passenger side door, tell her to get in, and move around to the driver's side. She doesn't move, so I have no choice. I come back around.
I could leave her. I could get on with my life. I could avoid this.
But I can’t. She's been cut loose like a ship that has snapped its mooring line. She’s Drifting, and that makes her my responsibility. I will find a way to push her back into the Bright, or I will teach her to Drift. I owe that much to the man who taught me.
At least I know where to take her. Looks like I’ll have company for that drive up the Taconic.
The Diary of the Empties
By Craig Soffer
It's an Empty time and I'm Drifting. The restaurant bar is packed but quiet, the conversations around me muted. The Phil Collins song In the Air ends and is replaced by Mummy Calls’ even Emptier Beauty Has Her Way. Talk shifts from the harsh realities of work and school, bosses and assignments, to dreamier things. Philosophy. Metaphysics. Star Wars. My gin and tonic tastes better than it should. Alcohol, like drugs, can open the way for the Empty. There's no smoking in the bar, and no one is lighting up, yet somehow there's still smoke hanging in the air. A line of conversation catches my ear.
"It's a great place, I mean, you'd love it."
I tune in on a guy in a shirt and tie, girl in a black dress.
"It's got like ten acres of woods, and you can see billions of stars in the sky at night."
"Really?" she says though her body language says she doesn’t care.
"Yeah,” he says. "My parents go up there, like every weekend. They're up there today, but they're coming back tonight. It's like their thing; they go up on Friday evenings, after work. It's like a two hour drive, straight up the Taconic."
"The Taconic, what's that?" she says, flipping her hair.
She's a different kind of empty.
"Look," he says, taking out a smartphone. "I'll show you on Google maps."
Office-Geek starts working an app on his phone. I move up behind them. I have to be subtle about it, but I'm also the kind of guy nobody ever notices.
"So," he says after we've all spent longer looking at the map than necessary, "what do you say? We can drive up any day this week if you can get off work. My parents won't be back up there until late Friday night the earliest."
She looks at him for a moment, then looks away and says, "I have to think about it, you know, because it's not so easy for me to take time off from work, especially this time of year and all," and he translates that into a very strong maybe, but I recognize it for the no-fucking-way that it is. I will be the only one heading to his parents’ place. My shoulder bumps Office-Geek as I slip to another spot at the bar.
"Sorry."
"Whatever."
My car, this weekend's car, is parked outside. It's an Empty, of course, a vehicle that spends its life in a long-term parking lot, heading out on the rare Saturday for a spin on Riverside Drive. Today is Sunday; the car won't be missed until long after it's taken me to this guy’s Empty weekend house where, hopefully, there will be a full fridge.
The music turns again, Jazz instrumental, Coltrane. Time to get moving before I end up part of something I'd just as soon avoid. As soon as I think it, out of the corner of my eye, I see just that something, not there one moment and then there the next, sitting at the very end of the bar, hands wrapped around a double shot of Jameson. A Dirtbag. A hunter out of the Deep Empty. He has a unibrow, sideburns practically muttonchops, hair that looks like a cockroach graveyard.
His eyes find what what he's looking for at the same time mine do. A conversation rapidly becoming an argument at a table for six, and one of those six slipping towards the Empty as the argument gets more intense. I follow the Dirtbag's eyes to a blond, maybe seventeen, maybe not quite, pale, light colored eyes, waif-thin, with an unusually large chest hiding under a heavy brown wool-knit sweater with a turtleneck the size of a life preserver, oversized sleeves that have swallowed her arms. She stares down into her soup bowl while her parents and siblings go at it around her.
I tune in as best I can, despite the distance, and I hear a lot of angry whispers and the father shouts, "Well, she's obviously never given a though to what it's meant to our family’s reputation!"
The girl looks away, staring off into the Empty. The Dirtbag moves, rises like wind through a pile of trash. I wonder why he wants her. I suppose it doesn’t matter.
The argument escalates. The older brother calls for the check. The older sister runs out. The father puts on his coat. When the server arrives, the mother materializes a credit card. The father leaves first. And then they are all gone, except her. They leave her, sitting alone at the table.
I stand and toss an old twenty-dollar bill I lifted from Office-Geek’s pocket moments before onto the bar. The girl is on the way to the restrooms. She stumbles through the smoky darkness. The Dirtbag follows her.
The nice car I stole is waiting outside. I have that Google map memorized. But still I’m moving.
Her ponytail disappears through a door and the Dirtbag catches the door before it closes, and then I'm there, behind him. "Hey, this one's the men's room," I say and jerk a thumb towards the adjacent door.
He turns, startled, glares. I take a deep breath. I can smell the Empty on him. I smile. I know what you are and you know what I am. Let’s not do this here.
He growls and turns away. I step back to let him go and try not to breathe in his stink. He moves out into the crowd, disappears into it, becomes part of the dark and the smoke and the sad music the way only something out of the Empty can. I push open the door.
She's in the stall. I turn to the sink and wash my hands, whistling a tune. "Man," I say aloud, pretending to be looking in the mirror, "but I need a haircut." It’s true. My hair pushes unruly into anarchy.
No response. The girl in the stall does not stir.
“Hey,” I say.
No response. Damn it. I can't leave her in here. Not with him out there. I try to open the stall door, but its bolted.
"Hey, open the door," I say, but she ignores me, or doesn't hear me. I have no choice. I work the hinges out with my pocketknife, his pocketknife--he’s the reason I’m doing this--work the door off, and set it aside. She never stirs. She's on the toilet, but her pants are on, the seat cover is down, and she's simply sitting there, staring at nothing.
I fold the knife away. "Hey," I say. "You need to come with me. You can't stay here."
She doesn't answer me. She's almost catatonic.
I reach out and take her arm by the wrist. It doesn't take any strength for me to pull her up, and we make eye contact for the first time. She smells like roses and vanilla and something citrusy. I lead her out of the bathroom and she follows uncomplaining, her eyes starting into Emptiness. Once we’re in the middle of the restaurant, I think she gets hold of herself for a moment and she says, “They left me here. They hate me because of what I write in my diary. It disappears after I write it.”
I'm still holding her wrist. I look around and spot the Dirtbag. He's watching us. He licks his lips with his fat tongue.
"Come on," I say, moving her through the crowded room. Ben Williams Things Don't Exist plays from hidden speakers.
I drag her through the restaurant, out through the even more crowded bar, and we finally make the front door and stumble out into the street. A flash of white in the sky and thunder booms. It's been drizzling and the rain has left on the pavement puddles that bend the light in strange ways. I get her moving. The Dirtbag follows, shambling, simian-like, knuckles practically scraping sidewalk.
"Come on," I say. We move a little faster and reach the stolen car I'm using. I hit the beeper hanging from the keys to the car, a 2009 gray Saab with dark leather interior, and the car responds with an answering beep and the sound of its doors unlocking. I reach out, open the passenger side door, tell her to get in, and move around to the driver's side. She doesn't move, so I have no choice. I come back around.
I could leave her. I could get on with my life. I could avoid this.
But I can’t. She's been cut loose like a ship that has snapped its mooring line. She’s Drifting, and that makes her my responsibility. I will find a way to push her back into the Bright, or I will teach her to Drift. I owe that much to the man who taught me.
At least I know where to take her. Looks like I’ll have company for that drive up the Taconic.
This is really fun. It leaves me wanting more for sure. I want to know what the Empty is. I would surely pick this up if I saw it in a book store.
ReplyDeleteThis really had me wanting more. Great work! I'd definitely be interested in reading the rest of it. Best wishes, Gregory
ReplyDeleteI can hear a whole series behind this introduction. I agree with Authoress, if I read that much, I would buy the book.
ReplyDeleteNice! The short chapter raised my curiosity of finding out what the Bright and the Empty, the Drifting one and the Dirtbag are. I'm waiting for the book to be published.
ReplyDeleteFor anyone interested, a bit more of "Diary" is up on my blog here: http://wp.me/p2Xyze-a4.
ReplyDelete